BRASÍLIA: Arabica coffee, the mild-tasting bean type favored by Starbucks Corp., surged to the highest since February 2015 after Brazil’s largest producer cut its export estimate for 2016 amid rising domestic consumption and the effects of drought. The Cooxupe cooperative now sees coffee shipments totaling as many as 4 million bags this year, Commercial Director Lucio Dias said Tuesday. That’s down from an April outlook of as many as 4.5 million bags amid tighter domestic supplies (a bag weighs 60 kilograms, or 132 pounds).
Arabica coffee for December delivery rose as much as 4.3 percent on ICE Futures U.S., and settled at $1.645 a pound at 1:30 p.m. in New York. It’s headed for the sixth straight monthly gain, the longest such streak since 2005. Prices are drawing support from “continued concern” over longer-term supplies of arabica from Brazil and similar concerns over robusta beans, Johannesburg-based trader I. & M. Smith Ltd. said in a report.
